Think DOT’s bicycle program has lost its mojo? Transportation Commissioner Polly Trottenberg begs to differ, and she made her case today at an event highlighting bike projects that are now in progress or have recently been completed.

Last year, Bicycling Magazine named New York the best American city for biking, just nine months after Trottenberg took over at DOT. “We felt an obligation to double down on our efforts to encourage and support bicycling in New York City,” Trottenberg said at a press conference this morning touting the administration’s bike lane progress. “Expanding and upgrading the bicycle network is an important step.”

The city is on track to install 12 miles of protected bike lanes by the end of the year, above its five-mile annual target and the highest amount ever installed in a calendar year. The city has also surpassed 1,000 miles of bicycle facilities, DOT said, with 1,010 miles citywide.

There’s no doubt that protected bike lane mileage is expanding at a healthy clip this year, but there are some asterisks.

Not all of these bike lanes are protected from car traffic by parked vehicles or concrete barriers. Some are separated from moving cars only by flexible posts. DOT also includes Vernon Boulevard, a two-way bikeway from 2013 that received concrete barriers this year, and E. 37th Street, which was striped last November, in its totals for this year.

While its progress on protected bike lanes is encouraging, DOT’s overall bike lane numbers are less robust. The agency has installed 27 miles of bike lanes so far this year, Trottenberg said, 23 miles short of its 50-mile annual goal.

The 1,000-mile bicycle facility number includes “shared and signed routes” like sharrows, extra-wide parking lanes and signed routes, which account for 24 percent of the total.

Another third of the total is managed by the Parks Department, said Parks Commissioner Mitchell Silver, including everything from major greenways to boardwalks and dirt trails. Much of these off-street paths are high-quality bikeways, but the Parks Department doesn’t manage them as transportation routes, meaning they tend to be closed at night.

Total bike facility mileage as of September 2015. Chart: DOT

With Manhattan having a higher concentration of bike lanes than the other boroughs, Trottenberg said she hopes to accelerate bike network expansion outside the city core.

“Now, outer-borough areas also are connected with bike lanes,” said City Council Transportation Committee Chair Ydanis Rodriguez. “That represents… how this mayor, how this commissioner, are doing the work and how they are fighting against inequality.”

Trottenberg and other speakers also acknowledged a gender gap in New York City cycling. “Comfort is a huge part of female ridership,” said Casey Ashenhurst, director of WE Bike, which aims to get more women cycling. “Bike infrastructure is a huge part of getting more women on bikes.”

A top complaint from cyclists is that DOT can take years to replace faded bike markings. Trottenberg acknowledged that challenge, blaming it in part on rough winter weather. “We have now got an aggressive new contract in, and we are looking at a bunch of things to try and improve the durability of the striping — looking at some better products, looking at doing more scarification, essentially, in the roadways so the paint will stick better,” she said.

The event was held along the Clinton Street bikeway, which is being installed after receiving support from Manhattan Community Board 3 earlier this year. Older residents of the Seward Park Cooperative apartments, which has buildings on both sides of Clinton, crashed the press conference to oppose the new bike lane and the 2012 change that moved some Williamsburg Bridge-bound drivers to Clinton Street. “The blood is on your hands when I get hit by a bike!” one audience member yelled at Trottenberg.

The Seward Park residents also wanted a mid-block crosswalk on Clinton between Grand Street and East Broadway, a longstanding request [PDF]. Before today, DOT said only that it would study the idea, said CB 3 transportation committee chair Karen Blatt. After the press conference today, Trottenberg promised residents that a mid-block crossing would be installed.

Council Members Ben Kallos and Helen Rosenthal were also at today’s event. Sensing the anti-bike sentiment from local seniors, the Upper East and Upper West Side council members bragged about how their localprecincts were cracking down on cyclists.

Even if you live in a dense, urban area with mostly short trips, higher speeds save a considerable amount of time. A 3 mile trip done at an average speed of 6 mph (which is about what you’ll manage if you ride at 10 mph and stop for red lights) will take you 30 minutes. The same trip done at an average of 15 mph (possible for an average cyclist with good, non-stop bike infrastructure) will take only 12 minutes. You save 36 minutes for the round trip. That’s HUGE.

Obviously a 31 mile round trip really isn’t even remotely practical for most people at 10 mph. That adds at least an hour to the round trip compared to biking at a faster, but still not strenuous, pace of 15 to 20 mph.

We need to demand as high a level of design as we can or few people will use these facilities. This “anything is good enough” attitude is how we got decades of conventional bike lanes in the door zone that no one used either.

There is a huge difference in the physical experience of riding in a 5 foot lane and that of a 6.5-7 foot lane and in the perception of social safety that they give. This is doubly true in New York where you have to be at some distance from the curb to find smooth pavement to ride on, and where people step off the curb onto the bike path without warning.

Maggie

Huh? What kind of hostility is this? Speed limits are an understood, everyday part of every locality’s approach to minimizing traffic deaths, damage, and injuries.

Joe R.

Yep. One big thing which causes many people to come out against bike infrastructure is when they see cyclists not using it simply because those cyclists consider such infrastructure unusable for various reasons. I would gladly use that facility, but probably would opt for the street with most NYC protected bike lanes.

Also very true about the pavement condition. When you have exclusive bike lanes which motor vehicles don’t go on at all, you can build them to high standards once, then are assured they’ll remain smooth for decades. Outside of frost heave, which can be avoided with good design, there are few things which will cause a well-built bike path to degrade over time. Indeed, if we look at the Roman roads which saw only foot and horse traffic, many are still usable to this day.

Alexander Vucelic

if a pol looks at the NY city bike map; it appears there already is a complete network

LOL

Joe R.

I think part of the issue here is the double standard where we’re aiming for a 20 or 25 mph limit for motorists in urban areas but have poorly designed bike facilities with a defacto speed limit under 10 mph in some cases. And on top of that some here say there isn’t a “need” to bike faster than 10 mph in urban areas, furthering the idea of a double standard. A bike facility should be designed to be usable at the speed limit for the parallel motor vehicle street. Granted, given the limitations of human power if the motor vehicle speed limit is much above 30 mph then this isn’t necessary, but it should be standard procedure in all other cases.

sensible internet commenter

No, that one looks better, but the other two you posted look almost exactly the same. I’m really not sure which one you were implying was a better design, because they both have marginal advantages but are overall equal. The width appeared to be the same in those two, but I absolutely agree 6.5-7 feet for a two-way bike lane is better than 5.

sensible internet commenter

Sustainable transportation supports density. The reverse is also true – your grocery trip is 8 miles round trip because you live in an automobile-oriented area. This does not mean bicycle infrastructure does not belong there; rather, it means that bicycle infrastructure can encourage infill development so that your grocery store could be much, much less than 8 miles away.

The problem is that there is no good reason why your grocery store is 8 miles away – that’s insane and clearly anti-urban. You do not need to bike fast if you live in an area that is actually built based on sustainable transportation modes.

Ook a Dook

protected bike lanes? great!! in midtown not so great when they are full
of pedestrians walking in them because they are perceived as auxiliary
sidewalks. in a lot of instances, some ironwork on the curbside needs to
be done to keep people out of the pathways. wheeling hot dog carts in
the bike paths are another big problem.

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